When Trump was asked at the debate whether climate change might have had a role in the California fires, he deflected by blaming them on poor forest management. Not a peep from Biden or Wallace, and not the subject of any news reporting we have seen. Here's the thing: Those California fires are primarily on federal lands.
[Prefatory Note: The following is from the NYT, which addresses the question whether you should breakup with your partner or stay together. Caution, if you go ahead and proceed to read this article, you probably already know the answer]
In a pandemic, it’s hard to tell when, and if, to break up. Are you frustrated with him because it’s the apocalypse, or are you frustrated with him because you’re incompatible?
That’s a hard thing to parse. You started dating that person for a reason, but things have changed. Maybe it’s you, maybe it’s them. Or maybe this experience of quarantine and prolonged anxiety is just water freezing in hairline cracks.
“Probably the two worst times to make a big, far-reaching decision are when you are feeling really bad, and feeling really good,” said Peter Pearson, a founder of the Couples Institute in Menlo Park, Calif. “Most of the time the biggest decisions require the head and heart working together.”
To help you doubters take an objective look, we asked experts about the questions they’d pose to patients. This amalgam is not any sort of when-to-dump equation. But pay attention to your answers. And, if you do decide to break up, do so kindly, but firmly. It’s not fair to waffle about “down the line” plans.
If the world were easier, would you still want to be with this person?
If you see your partner as a life raft right now, you’re not alone. It doesn’t mean your relationship is doomed.
But if you’re looking for a benchmark for when to leave — a vaccine, an anniversary — you’re probably not in it for the long haul, said Melissa Thoen, the clinical director at the Ackerman Institute for the Family in New York.
This doesn’t mean you have to jump ship immediately: Leases are real and there’s a pandemic going on. “It’s OK to not break up if you both understand that it’s a relationship of convenience with an expiration date,” said Sara Alexander, a marriage and family therapist in San Francisco.
But it’s only OK if you’re both on the same page. Otherwise, if they’re just a buoy to get you through to low tide, walk away. It’s the kindest thing to do.
Have your fights changed since the pandemic started?
If you’re fighting more than you were before lockdown, that’s not necessarily a red flag. Only you know how you feel things go when you disagree.
“A relationship without conflict is one that is not authentic,” said Kate Balestrieri, a licensed psychologist and founder of Modern Intimacy, with practices in Beverly Hills, Calif., Chicago and Miami. “What makes or breaks a relationship is how the couple fights.”
That’s hard to see, firsthand. But do you feel as though you’ve reached a deeper understanding after you argue? Or do your fights just stop because you’ve worn yourselves out?
Also, do you recognize the version of yourself who is fighting? If not, and if you’re angry, jealous or act out of character, that’s a real warning sign. No one should mess with your head enough that you become someone you don’t like.
Finally, if you keep locking horns over the same topics, you’re not moving forward. Fights about new things mean that you’ve resolved old snarls together. How long do you want to keep running headfirst into a tree?
Do negotiation and compromise feel like you’re losing ground?
Sometimes, you don’t get to do your thing when you want to do your thing. That’s super normal. Suck it up.
But feeling like you’re in danger of losing your stance when you disagree “is a red flag,” said Jenny TeGrotenhuis, a certified clinical trauma professional based in Kennewick, Wash.
One way to gauge this: Start taking note of how you feel in your shared space, even if you have your own apartments. “Even if your partner is an ‘amazing person’ you might somehow always end up feeling small around them,” said Anna Nicholaides, the owner of Philadelphia Couples Therapy.
This can be a hard thing to notice. If you’ve been in a extractive relationship for a long time, your own feelings might be opaque to you. But repeated annoyances about household chores will be salt on old wounds.
If you feel like your wishes are always coming second, they probably are.
Would you think your friend should keep dating this person?
It’s a good exercise to hear how this sounds to the people who know you the best. So ask a close friend to describe your relationship to you, as if it were theirs. Does it sound like it’s a healthy and supportive one to you? Would you tell them to wait until the dust settles, or would you tell them to call it quits?
If your friends don’t like your partner, that probably means your partner isn’t good for you. If your partner’s friends don’t like you, you’re probably not being the greatest version of yourself either.
If you could jump ahead to after the breakup, would you?
Breaking up is one way to change your life by taking something out of it. That loss, no matter how milquetoast your partner is, will have jagged edges for a while. In a pandemic, when loneliness abounds, it might well be harder.
But if the fear of that fleeting pain is the thing that’s keeping you around, maybe just get it over with. There is so much in flux right now that you might actually have the freedom to leave a city you don’t love without raising eyebrows.
“I really think that one day we ‘know’ in our hearts that we are done,” Ms. Alexander said. “It’s like an ‘event.’”
One thing people love about their Android phones and tablets is the ability to easily customize the look of their home screens. With its latest operating system (iOS 14), Apple finally has given iPhone users the ability to do the same. Our survey of iPhone users tells us they don't want to bother. But for those not represented by our survey sampling, this link will explain how: Link to Explanatory cnet Article
If you get a dialogue box like what appears below, first check that your anti-virus is up to date and that all the Windows Security settings show with green checks. If all that's fine, open Outlook as the Administrator, and then go to File/Options/Trust Center and change the Programmatic Access setting to the bottom option.
[Prefatory Disclosures: I have known the founder and former executive director of The Family School since she was 10 years old, and this is the first (and likely the last) time a post might suggest an eleemosynary cause for you consideration]
The Family School's mission is to prepare a diverse population of young children and their families for success in school and the community by providing the highest quality preschool and kindergarten education and integrated early intervention services. It tackles that mission with unbridled energy and the most exceptional level of skill and concern. As countless families whose children have gone through The Family School will attest, and observing professionals have confirmed, this place has performed nothing short of transformative miracles when it comes to rescuing children and families at serious risk. There's no doubt it's the finest undertaking of its kind in Phoenix, and is as good or better than any similar undertaking anywhere in the world.
Here's the point: If you think seating limitations have hurt the restaurant industry, attendance limitations have crushed learning centers such as The Family School. Yes, it's open, and it's functioning. But the attendance limitation substantially impacts the financial underpinning provided by tuition from those families who can afford it to the detriment especially of families needing tuition waivers and other help. It is important that we all try to support local restaurants. It is beyond important that we all do what we can to support places such as The Family School.
Scenario: Say you tried to grow an avocado plant from an avocado pit with toothpicks on a window sill (as illustrated below). Unfortunately, it never sprouted. Worse, when you went to throw it away, and removed the leather coaster it was sitting on, the coaster tore away the finish from the window sill. Not wanting to have someone come into the house to do the refinishing, you decided to buy stripper. You go to Amazon and see a quart for $20 with free shipping and the same quart at Home Depot for $21 but $9 shipping. You then see at Home Depot a small aerosol version for $9 but again there will be a $9 shipping charge. You go back to the Amazon site and do not see the small aerosol version.
Solution: While it would have behooved you and Amazon to have listed the small aerosol option on the same listing as the quart listing, it did not. BUT, if put the small aerosol option into the Amazon search bar, up it will come for $9 and free shipping.
Lesson: Never assume that The Amazon does not have what you are looking for. That is not to say you might not do better elsewhere online. I'm just saying. It is what it is.
Text of Letter to the Failing NYT: "While Trump could support his claim that the Times’ story that he paid only $750 in taxes in 2016 and 2017 is false and fake news by disclosing his tax returns, the press and Biden would do well to request far less. Specifically, by simply asking Trump to disclose his 2016 and 2017 returns with everything redacted out except the line showing the taxes paid and the signatures of Trump and Melania, Trump’s “audit defense” and other bogus reasons for not disclosing the tax returns evaporate, the validity of the Times’ reporting is confirmed, and the country gets to see the truth."
This is the story about sinister characters who converge around a young man devoted to protecting those he loves in a postwar backwoods town teeming with corruption and brutality. It's brutal to watch, even the first 30 minutes before you give up, and thereafter for the next 30 minutes when the rest of the audience walked out. All the characters are difficult to watch and there does not appear anything redemptive or salutary or instructive or insightful in watching it.
There is one thing that those who will vote to keep Trump in office and those who will vote to throw him out, and that is what is at stake in this election. Thus, both groups see that the stakes are nothing less than freedom itself. The only difference is how "freedom" is defined by the two groups. The Trumpers see the election as saving freedom from anarchy and the second amendment. The anti-Trumpers see the election as saving all the other rights and principles set out in the constitution and the norms that has distinguished the American Experiment, hence, the country itself. Anyone who thinks the resolution of those two competing interest is attainable through rational discussion and compromise is living in a world that no longer exists. Much debt is owed the founding fathers for many of the ideals they gave us to pursue. Much blame as well for the burdens imposed the second amendment, slavery, and the electoral college.
[PS: Frank Bruni published the same thought shortly after this post appeared on the blog, but he used many more words to say. That said, he said it better]
The secret may lie in an “innate” immune response that targets unrecognized invaders, scientists say.
Children may be less affected by the coronavirus because of a type of immune response that helps them fight new infections, researchers found. Credit...Vassil Donev/EPA, via Shutterstock
Why the coronavirus affects children much less severely than adults has become an enduring mystery of the pandemic. The vast majority of children do not get sick; when they do, they usually recover.
The first study to compare the immune response in children with that in adults suggests a reason for children’s relative good fortune. In children, a branch of the immune system that evolved to protect against unfamiliar pathogens rapidlydestroys the coronavirus before it wreaks damage on their bodies, according to the research, published this week in Science Translational Medicine.
“The bottom line is, yes, children do respond differently immunologically to this virus, and it seems to be protecting the kids,” said Dr. Betsy Herold, a pediatric infectious disease expert at Albert Einstein College of Medicine who led the study.
In adults, the immune response is much more muted, she and her colleagues found.
When the body encounters an unfamiliar pathogen, it responds within hours with a flurry of immune activity, called an innate immune response. The body’s defenders are quickly recruited to the fight and begin releasing signals calling for backup.
But the coronavirus is new to everyone, and the innate system fades as adults grow older, leaving them more vulnerable. In the time it takes for an adult body to get the specialized adaptive system up and running, the virus has had time to do harm, Dr. Herold’s research suggests.
Image
Because children more often encounter viruses for the first time, their bodies respond with an “innate” immune reaction that may effectively fight off the coronavirus. Credit...Spencer Platt/Getty Images
She and her colleagues compared immune responses in 60 adults and 65 children and young adults under the age of 24, all of whom were hospitalized at the Montefiore Medical Center in New York City from March 13 to May 17.
The patients included 20 children with multisystem inflammatory syndrome, the severe and sometimes deadly immune overreaction linked to the coronavirus.
Over all, the children were only mildly affected by the virus, compared with adults, mostly reporting gastrointestinal symptoms like diarrhea and a loss of taste or smell. Only five children needed mechanical ventilation, compared with 22 of the adults; two children died, compared with 17 adults.
Coronavirus Schools Briefing:It’s back to school — or is it?
Children had much higher blood levels of two particular immune molecules, interleukin 17A and interferon gamma, the researchers found. The molecules were most abundant in the youngest patients and decreased progressively with age.
“We think that is protecting these younger children, particularly from severe respiratory disease, because that’s really the major difference between the adults and the kids,” Dr. Herold said.
In some adult Covid-19 patients, she added, the lack of a strong early response also may be setting off an intense and unregulated adaptive reaction that may lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome and death.
All viruses have tricks to evade the innate immune system, and the coronavirus is particularly adept. Produced early in the course of infection, interleukin 17A may help children thwart the virus’s attempts to evade the innate response and to ward off the later adaptive response.
“We think that also protects them from sort of making the more vigorous adaptive immune response that’s associated with that hyper-inflammation,” Dr. Herold said.
Other experts said the study was well done but suffered — as most studies of the coronavirus do — from enrolling patients too late in the infection.
The innate immune response is set off hours after exposure to a pathogen, but people generally don’t come to the hospital until about a week after infection with the coronavirus, when symptoms are severe, said Akiko Iwasaki, an immunologist at Yale University.
That’s too late to study how the innate immune system responds to the virus, she said, adding, “By the time people are sick, it’s way past that time point.”
Still, the new data negate a couple of popular theories about why children are protected from the virus, she said.
Some scientists have suspected that children may fare better because they tend to have had more recent exposure to coronaviruses that cause common colds, which might offer them some protection.
But the new study found no significant differences in the immune responses to those viruses between the groups, Dr. Iwasaki noted.
Another theory held that children generate a stronger antibody response that clears the virus more efficiently than in adults. But the new study found that the sickest older people actually produced the most powerful antibodies.
That result may confirm a nagging worry among researchers: that the presence of those potent antibodies contributes to the illness in adults, instead of helping them fight the virus — a phenomenon called antibody-dependent enhancement. Vaccine manufacturers are carefully monitoring trial subjects for signs of this problem.
“That’s a theme that everybody’s been dancing around,” said Dr. Jane C. Burns, a pediatric infectious disease expert at University of California, San Diego. “Is it possible that high titers of some antibodies actually are bad for you, as opposed to good for you?”
Researchers also must learn what happens in children after the initial immune surge, Dr. Burns said. Children produce a strong immune response, but their bodies must turn it off quickly after the danger has passed.
If this virus becomes endemic, like the coronaviruses causing common colds, children eventually will develop adaptive defenses so strong that they will not experience the problems that adults are having now, Dr. Mina said.
If you need a new doorbell, or just want to add a doorbell to a different door, it's now a snap and inexpensive. For under $15, you can install (without screws) a new wireless doorbell in under 2 minutes. There's a variety to choose from on The Amazon (including models where one doorbell will ring in multiple places as well as 2-doorbell models). We personally can vouch for the Voxon.
With Trump assured of getting his Supreme Court nominee confirmed, the Biden campaign should go full throttle after the Evangelicals. Here are some pitches:
Hey, Evangelicals, There's No Reason Any Longer to Vote for Trump
Hey, Evangelicals, You Got the Court You Wanted ... Don't Disgrace Yourself Further ... Vote for Biden
Hey, Evangelicals, Do You Really Think Jesus Would Still Vote for Trump?
Hey, Evangelicals, It's Not Too Late to Repent ... Vote for Biden
Experts warn that seemingly harmless interactions with close family and friends may be driving the spread of Covid.
Credit...Sarah Mazzetti
As the long pandemic summer comes to a close and many parents are desperate for life to return to at least some semblance of normal, experts and public health officials have noted an increase in some families beginning to engage in social activities that seemed too risky back in the spring.
“There is definitely more chatter and comfort with play dates these days,” said Dr. Nina Shapiro, a pediatric otolaryngologist at the David Geffen School of Medicine at U.C.L.A. “I also see more groups of families with kids out in my neighborhood and hear some large group parties going on in people’s backyards.”
NYT Parenting: Get evidence-based guidance, plus personal stories and tiny victories from other parents.
While reports of new coronavirus cases are down in many parts of the country compared with where they were over the summer, data released on Sept. 17 by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children’s Hospital Association suggest a worrying trend among children: the infection rate has increased by 56 percent since the beginning of August. (Experts noted that at least some of that increase may have been because of increased testing, though, and some states define “children” as those as old as 20.)
Public health officials don’t yet know exactly how small gatherings like play dates and informal family get-togethers have been contributing to Covid-19 spikes nationwide. There simply isn’t enough solid data. But some cities and states including Chicago, Los Angeles, Maryland and Michigan have noticed a connection.
On Sept. 1, Gov. Kate Brown of Oregon announced in a news release that she was extending Oregon’s state of emergency until November, in part because “small social get-togethers like barbecues and family celebrations have fueled wider community outbreaks in counties across Oregon.”
In a news conference on Aug. 31, Jan Malcolm, Minnesota’s health commissioner, pointed to informal gatherings as a source of recent spread there as well.
And on Sept. 9, Dr. Allison Arwady, the commissioner of the Chicago health department, said during a phone interview that the majority of spread was happening within households and via small household gatherings, “like the play dates,” she said.
“People, understandably, are feeling a little more comfortable from a Covid perspective,” said Dr. Arwady. “They are getting back together with neighbors and extended family and really expanding their bubble.”
But experts warn that even when around close friends and relatives, people still need to take precautions. “Somehow we have it in our mind if we’re gathering with our close family, there’s not the same disease spread risk that there is in public places,” Malcolm said during her news conference. “That is just not the case.”
Janna Diorio, a mother of two from Jacksonville, Fla., said that she has noticed other families starting to regularly socialize again, especially since schools have reopened. “It’s like going to school opened the floodgates,” she said. Recently, driving past a small local park, she noticed about five times more parents and kids playing together, without masks, than she had a few weeks prior. “The local mom Facebook pages are just request after request for play dates and playgroups,” she added.
Coronavirus Schools Briefing: It’s back to school — or is it?
Paul Guinnessy, a father of a 10-year-old who lives in Silver Spring, Md., also said he has noticed more families congregating recently, even though all public schools in his county were closed and doing remote-only learning. Earlier in September, a neighbor told him that she and other parents of first graders were getting their kids together to enjoy recess outside.
One potential health risk of such gatherings is that many children with Covid-19 don’t have symptoms. And when they do, it can be hard to tell if their symptoms were caused by the coronavirus. A study of 91 children in South Korea, published on Aug. 28 in JAMA Pediatrics, for instance, reported that 42 percent of the children who tested positive for the coronavirus were asymptomatic at the time. Families may join get-togethers without even realizing their kids could spread Covid-19, and potentially pass it on to higher-risk family members like grandparents.
Additionally, the percentage of Covid-19 hospitalizations involving kids in the U.S. has been increasing steadily, from 0.8 percent of total hospitalizations in May to 1.7 percent in mid-September, according to the A.A.P. and Children’s Hospital Association data.
“The fact that children are now making up a larger percentage of overall hospitalizations suggests to me that relative to the general population, more kids are getting infected,” said Dr. Sean O’Leary, a pediatrician and vice chairman of the A.A.P.’s committee on infectious diseases.
Some of those kids could have gotten infected in classrooms that have reopened, he said, but “it’s still not clear how many of those came from outside versus spread within schools.”
Though it may seem counterintuitive, large, formal settings are often safer than small, informal ones, because they typically require people to follow stringent rules to minimize risk, said Dr. Arwady.
At school, for instance, “even though the kids are in the classroom, their activities are very much prescribed,” said Dr. Ellen Wald, an infectious disease pediatrician at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. They are typically required to wear masks and sit at desks spaced six feet apart.
In Chicago, Dr. Arwady said, only about 5 to 6 percent of recent cases have been linked to crowded settings like large workplaces and long-term care facilities. Few are also coming from large events such as protests or religious services. The city even ran some in-person camps this summer, yet few children got infected, because strict protocols were in place.
Yet the opposite is often true when people get together casually. With friends and family, we relax; we take off our masks and aren’t as strict about policing our kids’ social distancing. But this isn’t a good idea, Dr. Arwady warned. “I think the settings where people are now feeling safe are the settings where the risk is, in many ways, actually highest,” she said. And if kids who get infected at small gatherings then go to school, they risk spreading it to their classmates, teachers and other school staff.
This doesn’t mean that families must lock themselves in the house for the rest of the year. But it is important for them to follow public health guidelines at all times, said Dr. O’Leary, even when meeting up informally with friends and family (unless they are participating in true pandemic pods, in which families socialize with one another and no one else).
Whenever possible, hold social gatherings outside, Dr. O’Leary advised, and make sure everyone wears masks, especially if they cannot stay at least six feet apart. If you have to be inside, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggest maximizing ventilation by opening windows or doors and having everyone wear masks and, again, keeping at least a six foot distance.
“Kids need to socialize, don’t get me wrong,” Dr. Arwady said. The goal is to “make sure that kids are getting the things that they need for their emotional development, for their mental health, but in ways that keep risk relatively low.”
If you have a miserable experience with Costco service (e.g., with Costco Concierge Warranty, which btw is a separate firm with which Costco contracts), you might write a letter (or better yet 3) to Costco Corporate (there is no way to email Costco and phoning customer support won't do you any good). Then, you just might get a call back from Costco's escalation team and, if you again set out the problems you had and suggestions for what Costco might do to change its warranty processing system, you just might be given the name and direct phone number of the person you are talking to, who will invite you to call any time not only in relation to the current warranty problem you have been experiencing, but also with respect to any other issue you might have in the future with Costco. In that vein, she is going to look into Costco's practice of changing the yearly cash cards it sends out to be able to be used online and not just in the stores, without, as you did this year, having to write Costco Corporate to exchange your cash card for a gift card. Her name and phone number are: Yeah, like, do you think I fell off the turnip truck yesterday?
Home refinancing has become attractive to many given the incredibly low mortgage interest rates. In looking to refi, here are three things to take note of:
1. Beginning December 1, Freddie and Fannie will be collective a new fee in the amount of 0.5%. It is explained in this link: Link to Explanation of New Refi Fee
2. Don't assume you have to get and pay for an appraisal. Question, beg, plead, complain, and cry if need be to the rep to waive a full appraisal (and accept a "drive-by" or online or none). It often can be done, and it will save you about $500.
3. As a loyal reader pointed out, if you run into problems dealing with PDF documents that all of a sudden are designated as "password protected," before spending any undue time trying to figure out why, call your rep and explain the issue and it should resolve easily. That said, here is a link for a free program that will remove the password protection that never should have been put on in the first instance: Link to Download Site
We gave Borgen the highest review possible, and there's no question, it's a magnificent show. The only problem is that, after you get past the first season, much like Game of Thrones, while each episode deals with a different political problem (and a couple of personal/relationship problems), the structure of each episode seems to be basically the same, which drains freshness from the show, and the personal/relationship stuff is not particularly compelling or insightful although there are some nice little twists now and then (e.g., SPOILER ALERT: addressing the new girlfriend with the old girlfriend's name).
It used to be that one could slide with a right-click to change the length of the URL (Address) Bar in Chrome to allow one to change the number of extension buttons that show. No longer can one do so that way. But, if you look at the right side of the extensions, you'll see a puzzle piece (as shown below). Clicking on it will list the extensions that don't appear on the Address bar. You can then pin any one you want to appear on the Address bar or leave unpinned anyone you don't want to appear. The URL length will change automatically.
With the release of iOS 14, Apple has added a whole bunch of fancy new features to your iPhone. If you haven't installed it yet, you should get your iPhone ready, then download iOS 14. After that's done, get ready to have some fun customizing your home screen, taking advantage of a new pseudo app drawer called App Library, and experimenting with widgets anywhere on your home screen. Yes, iOS 14 makes the iPhone look a lot like Android. Apple's signature widget is called Smart Stack, and it combines several app widgets that you can scroll through on your own, or let your iPhone decide which app to show you and when, based on how you use your phone.
Text of letter that won't be published by the Failing NYT: "As a person
of faith who was raised in and is deeply committed to Judeo-Christian ideals,
I felt great pride and renewal when the ministries of this country took strong
stances against immoral actions by our elected leaders. Thus, when they stood
up for their religions and for their flocks protesting the needless deaths that
were the result of senseless wars, they did what persons of the cloth are
supposed to do, and made this a better country for everyone. Why then, when our
elected leaders are intentionally and knowingly doing things (e.g., flouting
basic mitigation measures of masking and distancing by their words and by their
deeds) that have cost and will continue to cost tens of thousands of needless
deaths, are the ministries today sitting on the sidelines in eerie silence?"
Banner Health is now offering, by appointment, drive-through flu shots at the Arizona State Fair Grounds. Appointments can be made by phone or online. It's all explained at this link: Link to Explanatory Banner Health Website
WARNING: You can show up with no appointment, and after quite a few cars get there ahead of you, and yet you will process through quickly even if you're not a Banner patient. At the same time, you can be a Banner patient, show up 10 minutes before your appointment time, and sit in a hot shed, with no air conditioning and your car turned off, and so you have to keep your mask on, and take nearly an hour to be done with a shot that takes 1.5 seconds, while you watch 5 cars that came in after you go sailing through, and there was nothing identified or in particular that caused your delay other than sheer incompetence and a defective processing system (likely designed by the same people who designed the Costco Concierge Warranty Processing system).
[Prefatory Note re Image: If you find the image too small to read, click on it on the blog website itself and it should expland]
[Prefatory Note re Below Post: When it comes to distribution of a Covid-19 vaccine among those willing to take it, there are some easy questions and some difficult questions. For example, no one disputes that front-line medical personnel are at the top of the list. But, what about front-line grocery store check-outers? Or, is it better to vaccinate the vulnerable first (old people and people of color) or spreaders (young people)? Given that rationality and morality no longer seem to have a place in how America handles national issues, put us down as skeptical that any reasonable distribution plan will be implemented. That said, the below article from the WSJ op-ed pages, to the extent you dare trust anything from those pages, might be read as giving hope to the elderly who want to be at the front of the line]
[Prefatory Note re Images on This Blog: Last night, a loyal reader whom some think has a modicum of intelligence sent me an email because a review of the Jeffrey McDonald show embedded in the blog post as an image was too small for him to read. Given the fragility of his mental state, I explained that clicking or double-clicking on the image would enlarge it. I felt like saying, What part of clicking do you not get?]
[Prefatory Note re this Post: What appears below is an ad from the WSJ in its original size. I have no clue if there is still a shortage of N95 masks for front-line workers in which event it's problematic nor do I have any clue as to the bona fides, safety, or efficacy of these masks]
An astute loyal reader has directed our attention to The Wirecutter (aka the NYT), which has pulled together a guide that breaks down national chains’ (e.g., Amazon, Best Buy, Target, Walmart, et al) return policies, exceptions, and options so you can get your money back with as little hassle as possible.
Is there anything more frustrating than turning on your laptop in a public place (library, airport, doctor's office) and the login page won't come up so that you can have an internet connection? Yes, there is, but at the moment that happens, just like in golf where the only thing that matters is the next shot, there is nothing more frustrating. There are several ways to force that login page to open. This link goes through them all: Link to Forcing Open a Login Page You'll never remember them all, so store them someplace where you can access the article on your phone (which won't have the same debilitation).
Elon Musk just announced that he expects to have a $25,000 Tesla available in 2024. Putting aside that all his promises as to future deliveries have turned out to be wrong, and putting aside that the $35,000 Tesla will set you back over $50,000, it's something to give us hope as to just how wonderful the other side of pandemic might be.
If you have a laptop that serves as your base computer but you also travel with it, you certainly want to have a second power adaptor to keep in your travel so that you don't have to unplug and replug the power adaptor you use with your laptop at home. The power adaptor that came with your laptop likely is 45W. When you look for a compatible replacement, you'll see 45W and 65W models. From an electronics point of view, either is fine. The 65W will be a little heavier and will charge a little faster, but those are the only differences.
Even if you read and saw Fatal Vision or other tellings of the Jeffrey MacDonald murder mystery case, the below review from the WSJ might lead you to watch this latest iteration:
Long before the Emmys' came to their senses, we recommended Schitt's Creek in the highest terms, and we continue to do so. The really great news is that the sixth and final season will be available on Netflix on October 7. Yay!!!!
[Prefatory Note: NYU Marketing Professor Scott Galloway has written a lot about the death of the current university model's dependency on extremely high tuitions that have defied the gravitational pull on prices and costs that the internet and ecommerce and uberization have had on virtually every other institution. Here from the WSJ is a similar view from someone else. My personal view is that, while no one challenges the wisdom or necessity of having free public education through high school which began almost 200 years ago, given that a high school degree means very little any more and that a college degree means about as much as a high school degree meant decades ago, it is a mystery why the idea of free college education is not long-overdue]
To insert a colorful emoji into Outlook, Gmail, or just about anything you're typing into, just hit the Windows Key and . or the Windows Key and ; This panel will come up and all you need to do is double-click on the emoji you want. If you want to create a short-cut to any or all of these in Outlook, see the link below.
Suppose the following: Trump gets his nominee confirmed on the Supreme Court before the election, the result of which is that Evangelicals and others similarly-minded say, "Okay, that's the only reason we supported Trump so now we'll vote for Biden so that the country might return to decency and have competent president," and Biden then would win the election by a landslide. Would you favor Trump's getting his pre-election nominee confirmed?
Everyone has seen the Graduate but very few have figured out the key to understanding it. At heart, it is a Greek tragedy, which always involves at heart a forbidden, taboo act that comes back to destroy the transgressor. Many of the shots done by Mike Nichols are done in Greek tragedy style. But here is what you need to know to understand why Mrs. Robinson does what she does: Benjamin's father and Eileen's father are the same man, namely, Benjamin's father, which then sets Mrs. Robinson on a course to do whatever she can or has to do to stop the incest that would take place. If you doubt this at all, go back and listen to "Here's to You, Mrs. Robinson," which was written just for that movie, and pay close attention to the lyrics, especially, the line that explains the "family affair" that must be "kept from the children."
The Bureau gets rave reviews by everyone who has watched it. It's a CIA-type thing in French. The first episode of the first season is intriguing albeit confusing, but it definitely draws you in. If you speak French, you'll love the dialogue, but if not, there are sub-titles that do a pretty good job of translation although some nuances are missed. Here's the problem: While it's available on Amazon Prime, Season 1 will be available on Prime only until September 30. But, here's what's even worse: Once you get hooked, Season 2 and beyond are available only with a Sundance subscription, and Sundance has nothing worth watching other than the Bureau. All that said, we are too polite, forgiving, and understanding to point out that the loyal reader who had several opportunities to warn us about this outrageous state of affairs inexcusably omitted to do so until after the 3rd episode of the first season was watched and another recommender who is not a loyal reader failed to warn at all.
The fallacy of the sunk cost is a behavioral economic concept. Specifically, individuals commit the sunk cost fallacy when they continue a behavior or endeavor as a result of previously invested resources (time, money or effort) (Arkes & Blumer, 1985). This fallacy, which is related to loss aversion and status quo bias, can also be viewed as bias resulting from an ongoing commitment. For example, individuals sometimes order too much food and then over-eat just to “get their money’s worth”. Similarly, a person may have a $20 ticket to a concert and then drive for hours through a blizzard, just because she feels that she has to attend due to having made the initial investment. If the costs outweigh the benefits, the extra costs incurred (inconvenience, time or even money) are held in a different mental account than the one associated with the ticket transaction (Thaler, 1999). Research suggests that rats, mice, and humans are all sensitive to sunk costs after they have made the decision to pursue a reward (Sweis et al., 2018).
A brilliant loyal reader has articulated an application of the fallacy of the sunk cost that might or might not ever have been articulated before. Specifically, persons in a serious relationship of any length, but particularly one of years, often face the circumstance where the relationship has soured and likely is irretrievably lost. Yet, often one hears as a rationale for remaining in the relationship and keeping it going is that otherwise all those years together will be "lost" or "for nothing." That is not true: Whatever was gained from or benefitted by or the good that resulted from the relationship is NOT lost. It is what it was and what was good about it and the good that came from it will never go away or be diminished. Thus, what actually is at issue when deciding whether or not to continue the relationship is what the present and future are going to look like. The past is an irretrievably "sunk cost."
One of the most annoying and confounding issues is when a program inserts an item into your context menu and you don't want it. For example, Nitro Pro will do that (inserting Edit with Nitro Pro) in your context menu and it will stay there even after Nitro Pro has been uninstalled. CCleaner and Glary Utilities have Context Managers but the NP entry will not be listed (it's a sneaky little bastard). You can edit the registry but there is always a risk in doing so and it's not easy to find the item there anyhow. Several context managers say they can find it and remove it, but they can't. Here's one that can: ShellMenuView. After days of frustration, it will download and install in seconds and just 30 seconds later, the Nitro Pro context menu item will be gone and you can get back to your daily routine unburdened and refreshed. Best of all, unlike some other context manager programs that in effect remove the item from the registry, SMV just disables it which makes it disappear but does not muck with the registry and so that risk is avoided.
Do NOT try Nitro Pro. It's big, but the real problem is that it's invasive. Even after uninstalling it with Revo Uninstaller Pro and doing a deep remove, it shows up in the context menu of whatever other PDF reader you might be using or might use in the future. Strong efforts to get rid of it have been unsuccessful. Although it makes no practical difference and it is easy to ignore, you can imagine just how annoying it is for some people. Further, it seemed to eliminate the Print option in the context menu of PDF-Xchange portable, which is a wonderful program and recommended in earlier posts, FoxIt Reader seems to retain the Print function in the context menu. Unlike PDF-Xchange, FoxIt Reader, which is free, has "ticket support" which responds quickly (as well as phone support), so the issue has been submitted as a ticked and we will update any information learned, and seems to be an excellent alternative even if its favicon is not as pretty as PDF-Xchange's.
The only tolerable way to watch a pro golf tournament is to record it on DVR and speed up through most of the playback. Even with that, it can be an excruciatingly slow experience. One of our earlier suggestions (which as yet to be adopted) was to require whoever first putts to putt out without marking his ball unless doing so would have him or her stand in another player's line. Here's an even simpler and less controversial suggestions: Prohibit the use of so-called yardage books, which in reality are topographical maps, that the players spend inordinate time consulting and that in effect remove a large portion of golf as it used to be where one had to rely on one's eye and not some book of numbers and slopes and stuff as if golf were an enterprise of navigational skills and not a game. Sheesh!
